For SAP, the GCP partnership is evidence of the company's multi-cloud approach. Like providing SAP on multiple databases decades ago, the company is following the same path on infrastructure as a service. "The strategy is to provide as much choice as possible," Yen said. "We can't assume to tell which customer what backend to use."

SAP said it will utilize machine learning knowhow from multiple platforms including Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure. SAP's plan is to play in the application arena and be agnostic at lower cloud levels.

Among the moving parts of the Google-SAP partnership:

Integrations with Google's productivity suites continue.

SAP Netweaver is certified on GCP.

The two companies are connecting Google BigQuery with SAP's business analytics cloud. "Customers can take whatever they store in BigQuery and have a default integration to SAP analytics as well," Yen said.

At Sapphire, GCP and SAP will also showcase conversational experiences and chat and voice-based navigation as well as apps that leverage Google's machine learning APIs and TensorFlow.

Thank You

By registering you become a member of the CBS Interactive family of sites and you have read and agree to the Terms of Use, Privacy Policy and Video Services Policy. You agree to receive updates, alerts and promotions from CBS and that CBS may share information about you with our marketing partners so that they may contact you by email or otherwise about their products or services.
You will also receive a complimentary subscription to the ZDNet's Tech Update Today and ZDNet Announcement newsletters. You may unsubscribe from these newsletters at any time.